


fill the void with polished doubt

by tiansheng



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Feelings, Future Fic, M/M, but not that far in the future
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-16
Updated: 2020-12-16
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:48:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28109589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tiansheng/pseuds/tiansheng
Summary: The thing about homesickness was that Yangyang had never allowed it to settle in.
Relationships: Dong Si Cheng | WinWin/Liu Yang Yang
Comments: 4
Kudos: 56





	fill the void with polished doubt

Sicheng came in without warning, the way he’d been doing the past few days.

Yangyang had almost bit his head off the first time he barged into the room without knocking and spread himself out on Dejun’s chair, unprompted, leaning over his shoulder just in time to watch him blast the fuck out of the opposing team on Overwatch. Yangyang had startled at the sudden presence behind his back, nearly missing his shot and causing his friend to start cursing furiously. Afterwards he tossed his headset onto his keyboard, letting out a frustrated huff, and had turned to Sicheng, scowling.

“Don’t _do_ that.”

Sicheng had blinked at him, nonplussed. “Do what?”

Yangyang didn’t know what it was about Sicheng’s presence that put him so on edge. Maybe it was the fact that they would both rather keep to themselves, content to hole up in their rooms and live parallel lives in their overcrowded dorm, which nowadays was more empty than not, save for the two of them.

The absence had been expected, but the way it suddenly overtook him was not. It was especially jarring in the mornings: he’d wake up to two empty beds and a too-cold room, empty of any extra body heat; he kept waiting outside the bathroom before remembering no one would be inside; he kept forgetting to refill the hot water dispenser, and he’d shuffle over in the morning and press the dispense button only to find it was empty. There was no point in using their two-litre dispenser for two people, he told himself, before remembering that Sicheng always drank hot water in the mornings.

He’d been raised amidst cacophony, in a way. He had lived in a highrise over a city intersection in Taipei, streets alive with foodstall sellers from the early hours of the morning; when he’d come to Seoul, he had quickly adjusted to the unruly nature of the trainee dorms, and then the incessant noise of their own dorm after he’d debuted. There had always been a constant flow of movement, noise, _people,_ and it bothered him that he was now surrounded by empty pockets of space, instead.

It was only three or four months, he knew that, before the overlap between all the different subunits and filmings and secret projects matched up and everyone would be back, but it didn’t make the absence sting any less. Even sharper than the sting of not seeing his name listed on this round of promotional activities was the sting of knowing who would be leaving him behind. It was an absence so intense it was piercing some days, expanding from every empty corner of the dorm until it threatened to carve into him.

What bothered him even more than this was Sicheng, who had let the gaping absence of his name roll over him like water during the company meeting. Sicheng’s deflection of their concern was so familiar only because he’d been watching him act that way since day one, but he didn’t know how to begin to approach him about it.

It was Sicheng’s sudden attempt at closeness that irritated him, for reasons he couldn’t begin to formulate to himself. He didn’t need Sicheng’s company, not when he knew they’d both prefer to be alone; he was perfectly fine by himself, and judging by how often Sicheng went out on midnight runs, so was he. But here he was, spread-eagled on Yangyang’s bed, airpods in to watch a drama playing across his phone screen. Yangyang exited out of his match—they’d been losing anyway—and lifted his feet to the mattress, digging his toes into the underside of Sicheng’s thigh.

It took a few seconds, but Sicheng finally let out a yelp when his kneading got unbearable. He dropped his phone face-down onto his chest. “What, did you lose again?”

 _“You_ made me lose,” said Yangyang, even though it wasn’t true. “Why are you on my bed?”

Sicheng peered at him, dark eyes contemplative. “Heard it from a trusty source that you don’t like it when I use Dejun’s chair.”

It was true, but it annoyed him to admit it, and annoyed him even further that Sicheng had stated it so simply. “But my _bed—”_

“You’d rather I go lie on these _other_ beds?” Sicheng waved his hand in the general direction of the other two beds in the room, sheets neatly tucked in and stripped bare of blankets.

Yangyang followed the direction of his hand and winced. He tried to avoid looking too hard, when he could: the room looked too much like Kun and Dejun had moved out, so devoid of their usual clutter. He’d been buying more clothes than usual, trying to spill his belongings into the rest of the room to make up for it, but it wasn’t the same. It was just more of him instead of more of them.

He quickly looked back, only to meet Sicheng’s eyes. He was still watching him. His gaze had turned thoughtful, like was examining him, or maybe re-examining him; Yangyang wasn’t sure he wanted him to find anything.

The moment passed between them, suspended like a breath held before its release, and then it was broken. Sicheng swung his legs over the side of the bed, then placed a hand on Yangyang’s head and used it as leverage to stand up. “Come on,” he said, “what do you want to eat? Gege will pay.”

* * *

_The sunrise in Chongqing is great!_ Kun had sent the group, along with an onslaught of pictures: a landscape shot of a lush green mountainscape, the sky brushed purple; a slightly blurred snapshot of a hotpot restaurant; a selfie of him and one of his castmates, her smile bright and vaguely familiar to Yangyang. Kun was in the middle of filming his variety show, some music-related thing that always landed solid ratings, by virtue of simultaneously promoting local culture—it was this kind of thing that netizens ate up.

His message was met by the usual spam: heart emojis from Xuxi, a thumbs up from Dejun, a meme sticker from Guanheng. Yangyang stared at the chat before exiting out of the app. They hadn’t had a real conversation in weeks; with timezones and schedules to contend with, it was rare they’d all be awake and online at the same time.

His phone buzzed again, lighting up with one more notification from Sicheng, in their group chat: _美～,_ he’d sent. A second later Sicheng himself was coming out of their gym’s locker room, the door banging shut behind him.

He took in Yangyang, all changed with his winter coat on. “Ready to go?”

Yangyang silently pushed the exit door open, but Sicheng suddenly yanked him back, his hand warm over his shoulder. “Mask,” he said, holding an unopened one out to him. His own mask was pulled down under his chin.

Yangyang took it with a grunt that he hoped conveyed his thanks. Outside, the wind was biting even through his coat, but the company building wasn’t far.

He tried not to tense when Sicheng slung an arm across his shoulders. He was still wary of all this closeness—did Sicheng just think he needed to be looked after more? Like a didi? Was he going to stop when the others came back?

“It’s been a while since you said anything in the group chat,” Sicheng said casually. “Kun-ge keeps asking me if you’re alive.”

It _had_ been a while. Guilt churned in his stomach when he thought of all the notifications he’d deleted from his lockscreen in the first week, too busy feeling sorry for himself to answer, and then too busy feeling upset at himself for acting like this—like a child.

Yangyang shrugged as best as he could against the warm weight of Sicheng’s arm. “I don’t know what to say.”

Sicheng huffed. “Suddenly, you have nothing to say to them? You didn’t even answer Guanheng’s message about having a stopover in Taoyuan. He asked if you wanted anything from the airport.”

Yangyang looked sideways at Sicheng. His tone was casual, but by now it had been years, and he could read him with ease.

“How are you _okay_ with it?” He blurted, the thoughts that had been stewing in him all day boiling to the surface. “It’s been years, and—you just take it—”

He clamped his mouth shut before he could voice his own insecurities, what had been plaguing him ever since he sat through the company meeting: the sudden flash-forward he’d had to his own future, the fear that this first exclusion was setting him on a path of many.

Sicheng’s hand tightened around his shoulder, bringing him to a stop inches away from the entrance to their company building. “Yangyang,” he said quietly.

Yangyang swallowed around the block his throat, turning to look up at him.

“Don’t compare yourself to me,” he said, shaking him a little. “Okay?”

It was a dismissal as clear as any, and he felt it like a blow.

Sicheng was gripping onto him, his gaze intent. “Do you get what I'm saying?”

“Yeah,” he said, sullen. “Alright. I got it.”

* * *

The thing about homesickness was that he had never allowed it to settle in.

As a trainee, he had been able to see his family two or three times a year, taking days off to fly to Dusseldorf or London or Taipei, wherever they’d decided to remain for the holidays that year; sometimes his family would fly into Seoul to visit him. Even after he debuted, he had managed to visit them at least once a year.

Now, though, he was unable to go anywhere: the company wouldn’t grant him time off, in case there was a last-minute schedule. It was foreign to him, to miss his family so suddenly and so terribly in his fourth year after debut, and it made him feel restless. He was doomed to skulk around the dorm and the company building, unanchored, like he was about to jump out of his own skin.

He hated waiting, particularly when he didn’t know what he was waiting for. Worse than the waiting was the fact that there was no one he could expend his energy on. The gaming chair beside his sat cold and traitorously empty. Sicheng had entertained his offer to play one-on-one basketball a few times, but it wasn’t the same as trying to dunk on Guanheng or even Chenle. Normally he would have tried to bother one of his members until they snapped at him, but he didn’t feel too good about antagonizing his only remaining flatmate. Besides, Sicheng had gotten too good at giving into his ribbing lately, which always caught him off guard, leaving him with a growing feeling of something he couldn’t name.

“Aren’t you hungry?” Sicheng said to him that night. They had takeout spread out on the coffee table in front of the couch, and they were sitting on the stretching mats as they ate. By unspoken agreement, they had both started avoiding the kitchen, looming with its lights off to their left. Mostly it had been Kun and Ten and their dorm auntie who spent time there; the space wasn’t large by any means, but it felt too big and cavernous with only the two of them there.

Yangyang looked up from his phone, then jolted when Sicheng put a hand on his knee, which had been bouncing incessantly. Sicheng’s bowl was mostly cleared of food, but Yangyang hadn’t even taken a bite of his udon.

“Aren’t you hungry?” Sicheng repeated. “Your noodles are cold.”

“Winwin-hyung,” said Yangyang. He ran through all of the things he wanted to say, but none of them felt right to speak aloud.

“What is it?” Sicheng took Yangyang’s chopsticks from where they were abandoned on the table, stirring the slowly congealing noodles in his bowls. When he glanced back, the concern was open on his face, his gaze roving curiously over Yangyang. It made whatever courage he had mustered shrivel up.

“Winwin,” he said again. “Why don’t you ever let me come with you at night?”

“What?” Sicheng pulled back in surprise. “When I go running? You don’t run.”

“Maybe I want to start.”

Sicheng let out a laugh. “All the time we’ve been spending together isn’t too much for you?”

Heat prickled up Yangyang’s skin. “Is it too much for _you?”_ he said, before he really thought about what he was saying.

“Ah, baobei.” Whatever he had been expecting in response, it wasn’t that. Sicheng put a hand on his leg again, which had resumed its bouncing—betraying all of his nerves. He leaned closer until the full sincerity of his doe eyes was turned on Yangyang. “I like spending time with you, you know?”

“You—” Once, after a concert in Tianjin, they had gone out to eat and ended up all getting drunk; he doesn’t know who had started it, but they had started bothering Sicheng about who his favourite didi was. Yangyang had turned to look at Sicheng, who had been sitting beside him, and for a long stretch of a second he had been looking back, staring at Yangyang with an unreadable look on his face. Yangyang had held his breath for what he might say, but in the next second the moment was broken, and Sicheng was fending off Xuxi, flushed down to his neck, saying, _stop asking me, it’s Renjun!_

The memory rose to his mind now, but he didn’t know how to voice any of the questions he wanted to ask. “Ge,” he said instead, frustrated with himself. “You—are you—”

Sicheng squeezed his wrist, and maybe he could feel how fast his pulse was jackrabbiting through his sleeve, because his mouth curved into a close-lipped smile. “Don’t I always tell you I love you?”

It was both exactly what he wanted to hear and not what he wanted from him at all. Yangyang felt himself flush, shamed at being read so easily, but he was already cooling under Sicheng’s gaze. It was enough, he thought: the two of them, sitting in a dorm too large for them, everything unspoken echoing in the spaces between them. It was enough.

**Author's Note:**

> title from [false confidence](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWRWuY3pV2c) by noah kahan: "and I wonder why I tear myself down / to be built back up again."
> 
> i apologize for the louis/leon/bella erasure in this fic


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